The invention relates to the field of modern, high-feature printers and printing systems. More specifically, the invention relates to the efficient and flexible pre-processing and storage of presentation objects to allow faster print times.
Modern, computer-generated documents are often large, complex structures including many different images, photographs, charts and other types of presentation objects that can require significant time to print. Several different varieties of page description languages have been developed to describe to the printer the various features of these presentation objects, and other features of a document to be printed. In a typical configuration, a print server or printer controller is present in the printing system and is connected to the printer via some type of communication connection. The print server includes a print application that can be used to create documents and to select the document format, including the placement and use of the various presentation objects. These documents, and the accompanying formatting/printing information is passed to the printer by the print server via the communication connection and using the appropriate page description language.
As printer speeds continue to increase and as print data becomes more complex and more massive, performance tuning within the printer also becomes more important. Many modern printers require a user to preadjust and tune the print data being sent to a printer to ensure that the print data is processed efficiently by the printing system. However, there are many situation where it is impractical or impossible to pre-tune the data to improve performance. A few examples of such situations include:
color-image applications where images rotate or change size based on circumstances within the printed output (how and where items fit depending on variable text, etc.);
jobs that use presentation objects from a large collection; and
jobs that re-print portions of data objects, requiring trimming on-the-fly.
What is needed in the art is a way to direct a printer to perform as much tuning, adjustment and pre-preparation of objects as possible before actual printing begins. This allows a trade-off of early preparation time for improved throughput at print time—when time is typically more critical.